Ziggy is a small, bald, trouserless, barefoot, almost featureless character (save for his large nose) who seems to have no friends, hobbies, or romantic partner, just a menagerie of pets: Fuzz, a small white dog; Sid, a cat afraid of mice; Josh, a discouraging parrot; Goldie, a fish; and Wack, a duck. The appeal of the cast is juxtaposed with the endless stream of misfortunes which befall Ziggy. The character is frequently depicted in surreal or arbitrary situations, though many jokes mine typical comic strippop culture territory, such as computers and the perils of modern life. Other pop cultural references can be found in the archives.

The episode "The Cartoon" of the sitcom Seinfeld centers on the character Elaine Benes publishing a cartoon that she unwittingly plagiarized from Ziggy. When Elaine's plagiarized cartoon was published in The New Yorker, the actual Ziggy retorted at the complaint desk again, saying "The New Yorker is stealing my ideas."

In one episode of the sitcom Cheers, the character Woody Boyd breaks into a fit of hysterical laughter after reading a Ziggy comic strip. Bar manager Rebecca Howe then asks who let him read it, as it is apparently his typical reaction to the strip.

In the "Brush with Greatness" episode of The Simpsons, Smithers is shown reading aloud a Ziggy comic strip to Mr. Burns: "So Ziggy goes to the repair shop -- there's a sign on the doorbell reading, `Out of order'!" Burns chuckles, "Ah, Ziggy... Will you ever win?"

Ziggy's lack of pants stoked the fire of Rat from the comic strip, Pearls Before Swine. In 2009, from December 12 through 16th, Rat held protests demanding Ziggy put on pants. On December 17 the issue was addressed in Ziggy's strip and on the 18th, Ziggy's pants were found at a dry cleaners and he has been seen wearing them intermittently since. This was a planned joke between Tom Wilson and Pearls artist Stephan Pastis, but due to a mixup the planned strips did not run in the order they were supposed to.[1]